1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a liquid container that has an erroneous insertion prevention mechanism for preventing erroneous insertion into a container mounting portion of a liquid ejection apparatus.
2. Related Art
In a color ink jet type printer (liquid ejection apparatus) that performs color printing, ink cartridges (liquid containers) as exclusive-use containers, in which ink of different colors of B (black), C (cyan), M (magenta), and Y (yellow) are filled, respectively, are used. Ink (liquid) filled in the individual ink cartridges are supplied to a printing head that is driven according to print data transmitted from a host computer and is then ejected at a target position on a printed matter, such as a paper or the like, through nozzles of the respective colors provided in the printing head.
In recent years, in order to realize high-definition full color printing, color ink that is mounted on a printer includes intermediate colors of DY (dark yellow) or LC (light cyan), in addition to C (cyan), M (magenta), and Y (yellow) Then, the number of ink cartridges that are mounted on one printer increases.
An exclusive-use cartridge mounting portion (container mounting portion) for each color is provided in the printer. However, when the ink cartridges having the same exterior size are used for the respective colors, the similar cartridge mounting portions are also arranged, and thus a user may mistake a mounting position.
When an ink cartridge is mounted at an erroneous color position, ink around an ink supply port of the cartridge and ink of a different color remaining around an ink supply needle of the printer may be mixed with each other. Accordingly, print quality may be degraded.
Further, when a plurality of ink cartridges that substantially have the same exterior and contain different kinds of ink (for example, dye or pigment) are manufactured, a pigment printer and parts of the pigment printer can be shared. However, since the ink cartridges that substantially have the same shape and contain different kinds of ink are sold, an ink cartridge of an erroneous ink kind may be inserted into the printer. If a pigment ink cartridge is erroneously inserted into the pigment printer, pigment ink around an ink supply port of the ink cartridge and pigment ink remaining around an ink supply needle of the printer may be mixed with each other. Then, the pigment may be aggregated and clogging may occur in the head.
In addition, when a plurality of ink cartridges that have substantially the same exterior and contain different filling amounts of ink are manufactured, in a printer that is expected to perform printing in small quantity, a cheap and small-capacity ink cartridge can be provided. Further, in a printer that is expected to perform printing in large quantity, a large-capacity ink cartridge can be provided with a low unit cost per 1 g of ink. However, since the ink cartridges that substantially have the same shape but different capacities are sold, an ink cartridge having an erroneous capacity may be inserted into the printer. If a small-capacity ink cartridge is inserted into a large-capacity printer, even it ink is exhausted, printing may be continuously performed, and thus the head may break down. To the contrary, if a large-capacity ink cartridge is inserted into a small-capacity printer, even if ink still remains, ink end may be judged, and thus a large quantity of ink may remain.
Accordingly, there is suggested a technology that selectively provides identification convex portions (or concave portions) at a plurality of positions defined in a partial region of the carriage as an erroneous insertion prevention mechanism, which prevents an ink cartridge from being erroneously inserted into an unconformable different cartridge mounting portion (for example, see Patent Documents 1 to 5).
Patent Document 1: JP-A-2003-34040
Patent Document 2: JP-A-2002-234178
Patent Document 3: JP-A-11-170567
Patent Document 4: JP-A-2003-341087
Patent Document 5: JP-A-8-90788
As described above, the number of ink cartridges having similar shapes increases, and thus the erroneous insertion prevention mechanism needs to be structured to identify a larger number of kinds of ink cartridges.
As the number of kinds of ink cartridges to be identified increases, the size of the erroneous insertion prevention mechanism becomes large. Then, the volume of an ink containing chamber of the cartridge may be pressed. Further, the structure for identification may be complicated, and manufacturing costs may be increased.